<p>Meanwhile, outside the CC bubble of $150K families looking for merit aid . . . </p>
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<p><a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/31/education/elite-colleges-differ-on-how-they-aid-poor.html?hp[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/31/education/elite-colleges-differ-on-how-they-aid-poor.html?hp</a></p>
<p>We gave D a dollar figure (20K) that we would give her each year, then did a LOT of research to see what that would buy at various schools. At UC Berkeley & UCLA (some early favorites) she would need to earn/borrow about $12K per year. At U of A, with the full tuition scholarship, she would have money left over. All the UC’s have since dropped off her list, replaced by U of A and several other schools where she has a shot at a full tuition scholarship. Cost has definitely been the driving factor in our search. Just knowing that U of A is there as an affordable option has been a great relief.</p>
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<p>Does “need met” in this context mean loans? (I don’t consider loans to be aid, myself…I can get loans anytime, anywhere). Or do you mean grants and scholarships?</p>
<p>You are right that it makes little sense to not meet needs of your own state students while giving large merit aids to OOS students.</p>
<p>Thanks for the list! I appreciate it and several schools we are looking at are already on the list, so that’s good!</p>
<p>I suspect that what can be discovered about a list such as that in post #135 is that it does indeed include federal and state aid.</p>
<p>For example Purdue is on the list in spot #23. I can guarantee that Purdue is not known for their generous need-based aid. As an Indiana resident I personally know several students, some middle-low or low income that received little to no need-based aid from Purdue. </p>
<p>For my son we had an EFC of about $10K, Purdue’s total cost is just above $20K, we were offered a $2K need-based grant, leaving a gap of $8-9K (assuming I could pay the EFC with no trouble), even after federal loans there’d be an unmet gap. I know another lower income student, while I don’t know her exact EFC, I know it’s below my S’s and she was offered the same need-based institutional grant. </p>
<p>Purdue can claim they meet need for many students because of STATE aid. For those students that qualify in Indiana, they get tuition funded at any public school via the 21st century scholars program and there are additional state grants that may be awarded. So a student with an EFC of $0, who gets full tutition covered via the 21st century scholars program, gets a state grant, gets a Pell grant, and gets the $2K instititional award suddenly has college funded without even taking a loan and Purdue can claim they met 100% of that student’s need because that $2K did cover 100% of need after all other awards were applied. (Which looks great for their stats)</p>
<p>I don’t personally know much about U of Washington, but per their website they offer the Husky Promise - and “We believe students from all economic backgrounds should have the opportunity to attend the UW. If students are admitted to the UW and qualify for the Husky Promise, we promise to pay their tuition” sounds very generous. But a couple paragaphs below is - “Your tuition will be covered first by your federal and state grants — like the Pell Grant or State Need Grant.” And they also mention -Who is eligible for Husky Promise?..“Meet all eligibility criteria for the Pell Grant or State Need Grant Programs.” So the tutition they are offering to pay is what is left over after Pell and state grant’s are applied.</p>
<p>I ran their (UW’s) NPC with an EFC of $0 and it generated a report with $5645 in Pell Grant fudning, $10,868 in STATE aid, $3000 in work study, $7000 in loans (stafford, perkins, and PLUS) and… $518 in INSTITUTIONAL grants…$518.</p>
<p>I’m betting that list is HIGHLY correlated with states that provide significant funding to low-income students.</p>
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And I can attest to one who applied to both this past year, and ended up choosing neither. The overlap is most likely to be upper middle class - those for whom the cost of attending UA with a merit scholarship would be significantly lower than an Ivy, and who also realize they might want to save their money for grad school.</p>
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Part of that may be that for many families, even when need is met, it is still a struggle to pay for college. These colleges may also be competing for the same set of students, who can apply to many top colleges, and be accepted, but in the end can only attend one. It might be interesting to look at both the percentage of accepted students in the lower 50% by income, and also the yield among those accepted applicants, as compared to the yield among more affluent students.</p>
<p>^^^</p>
<p>Part of the problem is also, unfortunately, low-income students still aren’t being adequately prepared for college, especially competitive colleges.</p>
<p>I recently volunteered at a College Summit event (for those that feel they are experts in the college admissions process, Google it, you spend a long weekend helping low-income and first-generation students with the process) -</p>
<p>The students were all about to begin their senior year of high school. Most had never heard the acronym FAFSA and had no idea how to complete it and felt intimidated by it, MOST had not taken either the SAT or ACT and of those that did the scores were well below average - 18 may have been the highest ACT score I saw, most were in the 13-15 range, with a few exceptions most had below average GPAs 2.5 was probably the average, most had never stepped foot onto a college campus - a couple attended schools that took annual college ‘field trips’ since the families did not do this for their student. Many had no concept of college life and how it differed from high school - I spent one meeting discussing how in college your schedule may vary every day and you don’t have the same classes every day, many don’t have a concept of majors - I spent another meeting talking to a VERY good student (just under a 4.0GPA, but of course no test scores…) explaining the different branches of engineering because he (a rising high school senior) had never even heard of mechanical vs electrical vs civil vs aerospace…</p>
<p>These were GOOD kids and they were motivated (they were voluntarily spending part of their summer doing this) and they were driven… I spoke with one student that had a 2.7-2.8 HS GPA and no test scores entering her senior year that told me that she was going to go to med school and her grades didn’t represent her true potential… </p>
<p>Competitive colleges shouldn’t accept students that aren’t prepared for that environment…that’s just setting them up for failure. </p>
<p>As much as CC makes it seem like high-achieving, driven students who are aiming for HYP and full-tuition scholarships are the norm, they’re not, this is a small minority of students.</p>
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<p>The apples to apples comparison is that the low income California student is looking at a $8,500 to $10,000 net price after grants (from whatever source) at a UC or CSU, while a low income Alabama student is looking at a more than $20,000 net price after grants (from whatever source) at the University of Alabama.</p>
<p>Whether the grants come from the state university campus, the state university system, or a state government program not directly under the state university system is not all that important to the student looking for an affordable net price.</p>
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<p>The “gap” listed above may be the expected student contribution (ESC). Even the most generous with financial aid schools (e.g. Stanford, Harvard) have an ESC, though it varies from school to school (range seems to be $4,000 to $10,000 per year; at the low end, this means either Stafford loan or student work earnings, at the high end, this means both).</p>
<p>For example, the [Net</a> Price Calculator](<a href=“http://npc.fas.harvard.edu/]Net”>http://npc.fas.harvard.edu/) at Harvard gives a net price of $4,600 for a student getting maximum financial aid (they expect students to come up with this from work earnings). But lots of schools (including some that “meet 100% of need”) have ESCs of $8,000 to $10,000.</p>
<p>The problem with the ESC at schools that include the max in loans and a lot of works study in the aid package is that they leave few options to the student in terms of coming up with that money. At the top schools, there is often a no loan or sometimes only the subsidized loans as part of the aid package, so a student can take out the Direct loans for some or all of that ESC. When they are already part of the aid, that quashes that option. Throw in a hefty work study “award” and that eliminates working during the school year to make that money. If the kid lives in a place where there are few or no jobs available, it’s a big problem.</p>
<p>I have a friend who lives in an area where the adults with families are fighting over the part time jobs that often go to college/high school students. No way a young adult can make some of those ESC amount over the summer there. Also if transportation is an issue, it makes it nigh impossible. My friend needs the one car they have for her own work, and there are no public transportation options and you drive everywhere in her area. Yes, you can bum rides, but doing so for a lot of part time hours is impossible. </p>
<p>Also, $4K is a tough go to earn over the summer even in the best of circumstances IMO. Even 10 weeks at 40 hours a week at $8 an hour, you will fall short. And a lot of places are not giving 40 hour work weeks. My kids work at a place where the shifts are 6 hour increments. So even if you work 7 days a week, that’s a maximum of 42 hours, and getting that kind of schedule is not doable until the very end of the summer as students go back to school. The reality is that it’s 30 hours a week you can work. Trying to wrap another job around that is not easy either. I did have two kids who did that for a few summers, but they had all things come together for them the right way to be able to do that, and with each one backing up the other in case of conflict twith a third brother as spare to pitch in which was necessary a few times. Most people don’t have that.</p>
<p>I’ve seen packages where kids get the full Direct Loans, unsub and sub as part of their aid, $4K in work study money and still a gap of about $4-6K and with a low family EFC, parents aren’t likely to be able to come up with what’s needed.</p>
<p>Then you have the kids with no need or with packages that have no loans or work study who can use the Direct Loans to help out on the EFC And the kids can work part time whatever they can find to comfort level, and it’s all money in the pocket. Part of the intrinsic unfairness of the way financial aid works.</p>
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<p>I would guess ‘yes.’ I have found that every school I’ve encountered defines “aid” or “need met” as including everything … grants, scholarships, loans and work study. As Orwellian as that sounds.</p>
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<p>At schools which “meet full need”, the loans and/or work-study may be packaged, but are listed under ESC (which will be equal to net price for a student with maximum financial aid at a “meet full need” school – net price is list price minus only grants, not loans or work-study).</p>
<p>Regarding the Purdue example, it seems to be more complicated, with a mixture of need and merit based aid, according to [Purdue</a> Financial Aid Estimator and Net Price Calculator](<a href=“http://www.purdue.edu/apps/onepurdue/finaid/]Purdue”>http://www.purdue.edu/apps/onepurdue/finaid/) . Specifically, with EFC = $0, Purdue’s net price is $12,568 for Indiana residents, but is only $2,500 for those in the [SFA:</a> 21st Century Scholars Program](<a href=“CHE: Home”>CHE: Home) . It also seems to consider whether one has an Academic Honors high school program and what one’s high school GPA is to be relevant.</p>
<p>“I do not understand why I must cough up all this very private, personal financial information that I don’t share with anyone in order that my kid have opportunity to receive merit aid!”</p>
<p>My two kids applied to about 15 schools combined and they got merit awards at many of the places they were accepted to. I did not submit any financial information to any school.</p>
<p>Our HS guidance counsellors recommended filing the FA information even if you were pretty sure you would not qualify for need-based aid. I did not follow that advice. My theory was that by not even applying for FA the schools might be more likely to admit and give merit aid to my kids (since the school would know we would not be asking for any further FA later). It also seemed like a painful pointless process.</p>
<p>Like northwesty, both of my kids applied to numerous schools, both were awarded merit aid, and we have not filled out any financial information.</p>
<p>Northwesty and MD Mom, you have made my day! </p>
<p>I think we will do just that. There is no way in h e double hockey sticks that anyone is going to give us financial aid. I’m far too private to just spill that out there to be used however the holders of the data see fit, also. </p>
<p>Is there any downside or limitation to what schools might accept you?</p>
<p>TranquilMind, I strongly doubt that the FA staff have any personal interest in your personal life and/or financial data. Nor is it likely that they have any intention of using that information for nefarious purposes.</p>
<p>I worked for the Census Bureau recently, and collected a lot of very personal data, including financial stuff. I didn’t have the slightest personal interest in it.</p>
<p>These people see financial stuff for thousands and thousands of families. They’ve seen it all, from rags to riches. Yours just isn’t that special, I assure you. :)</p>
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<p>Not particularly. Among the schools that meet the highest percentage of need, the state’s contribution is all over the map, from practically nothing in Michigan, to the lion’s share in Washington State, and all points in between.</p>
<p>% of need met / school / source of need-based grant-scholarship aid</p>
<p>100% UVA, federal $8.5 million, state $5 million, university $48.8 million
100% UNC Chapel Hill, federal $16.3 million, state $12.7 million, university $59.2 million
95% Purdue, federal $26 million, state $20 million, university $32.7 million
90% Michigan, federal $20.1 mil, state $171,000, university $88.1 million
88% UC Santa Cruz, federal $32.9 million, state $73.9 million, university $71.8 million
(other UCs similar)
78% University of Washington, federal $38.2 million, state $55 million, university $40 million
77% University of Florida, federal $46.3 million, state $7.5 million*, university $19.5 million
75% Minnesota, federal $33.3 million, state $24.3 million, university $47.9 million
72% Wisconsin, federal $19.6 million, state $8.3 million, university $31.7 million</p>
<p>*The State of Florida awards UF students an additional $65.2 million in merit aid, some fraction of which goes to students with financial need</p>
<p>All figures from the universities’ 2012-13 Common Data Sets.</p>
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<p>The state of Michigan provides almost NO funding to students- regardless of income.
U of M meets 100% of need for in-state students.</p>
<p>Tranquilmind, the FAFSA is needed for some things. If you are in a state that has merit money like Florida’s Bright Futures, Georgia’s HOPE and other programs, though students get the money regardless of need or lack thereof, a FAFSA HAS to be filed in order to get the funds. Some colleges do require the FAFSA even for some pure merit awards, though I have truly not seen any personally. I’ve read about this here and there, and don’t doubt that it could happen at some college. FAFSA does not just screen financially, but also for things like citizenship and other issues that a college might find important. </p>
<p>Also, if your student wants to take out the DIRECT loans, a completed FAFSA is needed. If you want a PLUS loan, which is a parent Direct Loan, again, you need to have the FAFSA completed. You can complete a FAFSA and just have it processed without the info sent to the college if you so please, until and unless the need arises. But having it completed means not rushing at the 11th hour. You need PINs to file, and that takes time to apply and get them for parent and student. You need to fill it out with tax info or estimates thereof. It’s good to have those ducks in a row.</p>
<p>“Is there any downside or limitation to what schools might accept you?” </p>
<p>Tranquil – For my two kids, I tried to (as the saying goes) “fish where the fish are.”</p>
<p>We were not going to get FA anyplace. So we tried to identify schools (i) that did a lot of merit aid and (ii) where my kids would be above average applicants. Every kid is going to be above average at some school. </p>
<p>The results (in terms of admissions and also merit awards) were generally what we expected. The stretch schools (in terms of admissions) generally turned out also to be a stretch financially (since the merit money was little or none). Those schools were happy to have my kid, but only if I was willing to pay full sticker price.</p>
<p>At many of the schools we were fishing for, the application had a question that asked whether you intended to apply for FA or not. To me, that was a “wink wink” from the school that it was the type of pond I was looking for.</p>
<p>Kiplinger has a “best college values” database that shows how much merit money various schools do (both in terms of how many students get merit money and also what the average merit award is). That is the tool I heavily relied on to identify the ponds to fish in. Also includes good data on FA, so you can get a pretty good sense of where/how the school puts out its money.</p>